


The Choice You Made

by jdjunkie



Category: Stargate SG-1
Genre: Angst, Episode Related, Episode Tag, Episode: s08e10 Endgame, Established Relationship, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-05-20
Updated: 2014-05-20
Packaged: 2018-01-25 21:22:06
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,140
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1662887
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/jdjunkie/pseuds/jdjunkie
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>He wasn’t sure what frightened him most – Daniel being at his house when he got there, or Daniel not being there.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Choice You Made

**Author's Note:**

> Episode tag to Endgame, a response to the May 2014 Episode of the Month prompt at the jackdanielpromptfic comm at DW.

_“In the end that was the choice you made, and it doesn't matter how hard it was to make it. It matters that you did.”_ \-- Cassandra Clare, City of Glass.

 

 

“Knock, knock.”

Jack looked up from the file he’d read three times without once registering the words to find Daniel standing in the open office doorway.

“Since when did you knock?” He looked back at the file. Nope. Words still not registering. Not likely to now. He knew Daniel would turn up here eventually and he knew why.

“Since I didn’t know if I would be welcome.”

The words danced and fluttered before Jack’s eyes like anxious butterflies. He snapped the file shut. “I’m sure that’s never stopped you barging right in before.”

Daniel wandered in, hands in pockets, part-insouciance, part-irritant, entirely Daniel. “Ah, but before was different. Before, you weren’t the man.” He sat down carefully in the chair across the desk, wincing slightly and putting a hand to his ribs. A soft, annoyed hiss escaped his lips as he settled.

“You been checked out yet?” He had to ask. It was his job, along with making the right decisions. It was also his privilege to care for the man he loved. And that, right there, was at the nub of his problem. Today, those things seemed completely incompatible. And not for the first time. He’d let his issues show when Daniel was lost in the Rand Protectorate a matter of weeks ago. Thank god only Carter and Teal’c had been present when he’d almost lost it. He trusted them with his feelings. He just didn’t trust himself.

“I got into it on the al’kesh. Threw a couple of punches, got thrown around. Usual stuff. Nothing to worry about.” He winced again, running a soothing hand across his lower ribs. The gentling motion of those beautiful, long fingers was mesmerizing.

Jack clenched his jaw until it ached. He hated Daniel getting hurt and he hated it even more when he wasn’t there to exact immediate revenge. A swift jab to the offender’s jaw when Daniel wasn’t looking had worked wonders for his anger on past missions that had turned to shit. Now, he just sat behind a desk and heard about it all after the fact.

“Well, get yourself looked at anyway. It's not optional. Then go home and get some rest.”

“ _Home_ home or ...?”

Jack threw him _a not here, not now_ look that he knew would cut no ice at all when Daniel was in this mood.

“Wherever you hang your hat, Daniel.” Christ, he sounded like an ass even to himself.

“My ... hat.” Daniel pursed his lips and nodded. Only the dangerous flash of anger in his eyes belied the calm enunciation. He rose slowly from the chair and left in silence.

Jack watched him go. Paperwork suddenly seemed very appealing. If he was lucky, he’d pull an all-nighter and wouldn’t go home at all. He wanted to catch up with Carter and Teal’c before they left, and he still had to sign off Pendergast’s preliminary report and file his own comments on the mission. It was sure to make most interesting reading for those assessing his progress, or otherwise, as base commander. Otherwise, he guessed, was currently winning.

As he re-opened the file in front of him and began Mission Prevarication, he wasn’t sure what frightened him most – Daniel being at his house when he got there, or Daniel not being there.

He opened the top drawer of his desk and looked at the letter sitting there. It was an amended version of the one he’d penned while the team were trapped in Anubis’s secret base. He’d had this version ready to go since his little “Find it!” moment in his office when Daniel was AWOL. Perhaps he should go before being pushed. Retirement was looking like a fantastic option right about now. No more second-guessing his reactions. No more weight of responsibility that he had never sought and never particularly wanted, even though he’d told Weir it was on his list. He still wasn’t sure why he’d felt the need to impress her; maybe because she’d been impressed by Daniel and, god, that was all kinds of pathetic on his part. No more being around when his team, when _Daniel,_ needed his back-up the most. So, no option, realistically speaking.

He slammed the drawer shut with far more force than necessary.

>>>>> 

Daniel’s Jeep was still in the parking lot when Jack finally left the Mountain.

Daniel had left, though. Jack had contacts. He was the man.

Daniel, it transpired, was sitting in Jack’s truck.

Jack opened the door and eased into the driver’s seat, enjoying the sudden blast of warmth from the heater after the short walk in the cold night air. Actually, he’d been cold all day. He looked straight ahead through the windshield, noting the vehicles still there at this late hour – Carter’s sturdy Volvo, Harriman’s immaculately neat sedan, and a nice MGB GT from the late 70s. He had no idea who it belonged to, but it was nice to know someone had great taste. He traced its sleek, low lines, admired the wire wheels and the chrome fenders.

“People will talk,” Jack said, after a while, when it became obvious Daniel wasn’t going to speak first.

“My battery’s flat. I had your spare set of keys and I wasn’t going back inside when I knew you’d be out soon.”

Jack blinked. “That true. About the battery?”

“No.”

Jack sighed, the sound unfeasibly loud in the confined space.

Daniel took a deep breath. “I wanted to find out if I was welcome at your house. You seemed pissed at me in the Gateroom after my comment about blowing up the ship. I want to know that you want me in your home, your _bed,_ before I make a fucking idiot of myself by turning up and then being given the cold shoulder because we should really, _really,_ be past that shit now but I don’t know that we are because this is all new and different and I think we’re teetering on the edge of something. And it fucking terrifies me.” Daniel hadn’t looked at him once. They were both addressing their words to the almost-empty parking lot.

Jack winced. They were misfiring here on so many levels. His promotion had changed things. He hadn’t expected that. He wondered if Daniel, with his intuitive Always Being Right About the Important Stuff superpower, had expected it.

“I’m not pissed at you,” Jack said on a resigned exhale of breath. “Well, not beyond instigating a ridiculous plan that almost saw you blown to bits.” He turned to look at the man beside him and found someone worn thin after a tough mission and tight with tension. Still, he was the most beautiful thing in this or any universe.

“You didn’t have a ridiculous plan of your own, as I recall. And my ridiculous plan worked, so ...” Beautiful but exceedingly aggravating.

“I’m pissed at myself, Daniel.” He tried to keep the self-recrimination out of his voice. The last thing he wanted was Daniel to look at him with, yep, that expression right there – annoyance overlaid with sympathy, very likely empathy and love, damn it. “I can be the man, I can be your lover. I’m just not sure I can be both. And that really, _really_ sucks because I was damned sure I could.”

Daniel carefully shifted sideways in his seat, stifling an “Ow”, until his face was wholly turned towards Jack. Yep. Sympathy, empathy, love. All the anger had drained away. That was exactly what Jack didn’t want. Daniel’s anger kept them both honest, even when it hurt.

“You can do both. I know it, you know it. You’ve never once put me, or any of us, ahead of mission integrity, either as Colonel or General.”

“I think I lost that honorable record today, Daniel, don’t you?”

Daniel shook his head. “No. You trusted us to get the job done. You believed in the ability of your people. As always, we just ... cut it a little fine.” He shrugged. It was what SG-1 did. Without or without Jack in the field.

Jack closed his eyes and let his head fall back against the head rest. “Yeah. Well. I’m not sure that’s how the powers that be will see it.”

Daniel snorted. “They see things in black and white. They read bald mission reports. They weren’t there in the command room. Or inside your head.” He reached out, tentatively, and laid his hand over Jack’s. It was dark enough, and the hands were hidden enough, that surveillance cameras wouldn’t pick it up. It was a risk, though, and Jack couldn’t stop his hand from tensing. But the warmth of Daniel’s fingers felt so wonderful, and Daniel wouldn’t have let him pull his hand away even if Jack had tried.

“Look,” Daniel continued, his thumb stroking slowly over the back of Jack’s hand until Jack opened his eyes, “You trusted me. Believed in me. It’s what you’ve always done. You just have to believe in yourself.” In the half-light, Jack watched as Daniel’s face softened and a smile touched his lips. “I love you for believing in me, by the way,” he added, quietly. “What I said in the Gateroom wasn’t intended as a criticism, even though that’s how you heard it. It was an observation, and one I knew others, including you, would make.”

Somehow, Daniel always managed to get Jack to see things more clearly. Maybe that’s why things felt so off-kilter now. On missions, Jack had always had Daniel at his shoulder, a ready ear or challenging voice. These days, Jack’s decisions were usually Jack’s alone. It came with the territory. He missed Daniel’s immediate input, and needed it, more than he’d realized.

Jack watched Daniel’s thumb, stroking, stroking. It was hypnotic. “It _was_ a tough choice,” he said, softly.

“And there’ll be others. And you’ll do your best to make the right call every fucking time. They can’t ask more of you than that.”

“What if it wasn’t the right call? A lot of people could die.”

Daniel regarded him levelly. “A lot of people have died. More will. We’re fighting a war, Jack. You can’t second guess every decision. You got us back and the Stargate. That might just tip future odds on our favor. We do save the universe on a regular basis, after all.”

Jack blew out a deep breath, ignoring Daniel’s attempt at humor. “I don’t know. This promotion ... it’s changed things. It’s affecting the way I think, operate.” See, this was why he needed Daniel. He could tell him this stuff. He sure as hell wouldn’t say it to anyone else. And since he was unburdening ...“It’s changed us. I fucking hate that.”

Daniel squeezed his hand. “So, we adjust, we find an accommodation, just like we always have. It’s the alternative that scares me, Jack.” Jack saw the truth of it in his eyes. He could drown in that truth, that belief.

Jack closed his eyes and nodded, suddenly overwhelmingly exhausted. “Can we not talk about this anymore? Can we just ... talk about it after?”

Daniel’s eyes crinkled in an endearingly cute way. “So I am still welcome?”

It hurt that Daniel needed to hear him say it. Well, the misfiring ended here. “There will never, ever, be a time when I don’t want you in my bed. Even when you snore. Or spill potato chips.”

“That was your fault. You should have given me the bag when I tried to take it from you.”

“They were _mine._ ”

“Typical only child. Never likes to share.”

They laughed, the sound chasing away some of the fear and anger. They were starting to decompress after the rigors of the mission. Different rigors for each of them, but the toll on their nerves was the same. They still had a way to go, but it was a start.

Daniel let go of his hand. “Feel warmer?”

“Yeah.” Jack smiled tiredly at him. It had been a hell of a day.

They sat for a while, surveying the parking lot again. It was starting to snow, a fine curtain of white.

“That battery,” Daniel said, turning up the collar on his leather jacket, “I’ll give it one more try. It’s sure to be fine.” He reached for the door handle, turning to give Jack one long, last look. “I’ll see you at home.”

Jack started his engine, waited for Daniel to lift the Jeep’s hood, make a show of checking inside, close it again, open the car door and turn the engine over. He gave Jack the thumbs up for the benefit of any watching security and pulled away.

Jack put the truck in gear and followed him.

 

ends


End file.
